UNIFIL’s Sector East Headquarters today held a memorial ceremony in honour of a UNIFIL peacekeeper from Spain who was killed in the line of duty three years ago.

UNIFIL’s Sector East Commander Brigadier General Francisco Romero Mari and Spain’s ambassador to Lebanon José María Ferré De La Peña led the solemn ceremony held at a UN position in Abbasiya, south-east Lebanon, where Lance Corporal Francisco Javier Soria Toledo was killed in an Israeli artillery fire in 2015.

In his address, Brig. Gen. Romero said Private Soria presented as “an example of encouragement to all the soldiers to understand the commitment to preserve peace in Lebanon.”

Some 312 peacekeepers have lost their lives while serving the cause of peace in southern Lebanon since UNIFIL establishment in 1978. Lance Corporal Soria is one of 13 Spanish peacekeepers who have died while serving with UNIFIL since 2006.